Nick Bradbury and a number of RSS/Attention heavy weights are discussing methods and mechanisms for determining and storing attention information in either OPML or a dedicated Attention XML format.

I have, for a long time, used FeedDemon and I love Nick's work. With a growing number of aggregators generating and supporting Attention data we will all have a better experience trying to read and manage our news!

As we have always stated, TouchStone is not a competitor to full-fledged RSS readers. Rather it is a persistent UI that acts as a companion to any site/service so that the user can read news/updates/information about their applications at all times (in a ticker or sidebar format).

It so happens that we are all excited about RSS, but Touchstone could very well be a handy Microsoft Money companion as well (for example).

For example, Nick's FeedDemon could use Touchstone to alert the user of new content it acquires from feeds.

Why wouldn't he just stick to his existing alert system? He could!

But by using Touchstone as a supplement, he (or other developers) could take advantage of all the time we're spending on new and fancy alerts and a persistent news ticker/sidebar type interface that keeps the user informed even while FeedDemon is minimized.

When the user is ready to read their news - they would click the headline on Touchstone and head right back to FeedDemon where they belong.